LA releases sneak peek of reparations report

Los Angeles got its first look at a long-awaited report studying and documenting the experience of Black people in the city.

The report, titled “An Examination of African-American Experiences in Los Angeles,” was unveiled Tuesday by the Civil, Human Rights and Equity Department and its Reparations Advisory Commission. It includes six pages of policy recommendations and details the affects of police brutality, unequal access to healthcare, segregation in schools, and housing instability, among others, for more than a century.

California previously released its own reparations report, as has San Francisco and Oakland.

Councilmember Curren Price said in a statement that reparations signifies a commitment to confronting the legacy of racism with sincerity and integrity.

“Although we’ve made progress our ancestors could only dream of, much work remains to change hearts and minds, and Los Angeles will continue to be a leader in these long overdue efforts,” he said.

How they did it

A California State University, Northridge research team conducted a more than six-month study to learn how L.A. has affected Black and African American lives. In all, 618 people participated, with their ages ranging from 18 to 97 years old.

More than a third of the responses came from council District 8 — represented by Marqueece Harris-Dawson — and about 20% came from council District 10, which is represented by Heather Hutt.

The study analyzed a dozen areas of harm, including vestiges of slavery, an unjust legal system, political disenfranchisement, and the wealth gap.

What they found

Nearly two thirds of Black Angelenos surveyed reported that they or their families experienced police harassment between 1865 and 1968. Even more reported being impacted by over-policing from the post-Civil Rights Movement through the wake of the Black Lives Matter Movement, starting in 2013.

Black families weren’t allowed to live and purchase homes in certain neighborhoods during the 1950s and 1960s. Many found themselves confined to South L.A. and a corner of the San Fernando Valley, with the neighborhoods considered “undesirable” because of the surrounding industrial hazards, such as air pollution, toxic chemicals, and water contaminants.

“The erosion of physical health, increased number of deaths, and diminished growth of home equity due to forced residency near industrial pollutants resulted in an enormous cost of systemic racism in Los Angeles over many decades,” the study stated.

The greatest inequity seems to be in lead contaminant exposure in children, according to the study, with Black neighborhoods far more exposed than most of Los Angeles.

According to a separate 2016 report, more than two-thirds of white households are homeowners, while a little more than 40% of Black households are homeowners. The study states that current Black homeownership is directly related to the history of housing segregation in the city.

When it comes to the legal system, Black people made up more than a quarter of all arrests, despite being only 8% of the city’s population from 2020 through 2023. For comparison, white people made up 16% of all arrests, while sitting at 29% of the total population.

Black Angelenos have also been charged at 17 times the rate of white people under the state’s “Three Strikes and You’re Out” measure.

What the report recommends

It concludes with about 60 recommendations for the city throughout each aspect of the study.

The report recommends establishing a dedicated task force focused on tracking and reporting the city’s reparations initiatives, potentially including a website to keep people informed and hold L.A. accountable.

It also calls for solutions that would address the racial wealth gap, including possible payments or an income tax reduction.

The study does acknowledge several limitations it faced, including access to data. It recommends a more robust understanding of the impact the city’s policies and departments had, and continue to have, on Black Angelenos.

What's next

The full report is expected to be released in late fall, and it would then go to City Council for their consideration.